Revelation or Realization: The Conflict in Theosophy.

Introduction.

Following is a thoughtful text by a Dutch theosophist, J.J. van
der Leeuw, commenting on some deep Theosophical questions brought to
the fore by Krishnamurti's critique of Theosophy. It is based on a
lecture delivered to the London Federation of the Theosophical
Society on June 15th, to the Dutch Convention on June 21st, and to
the Geneva Congress of the European Federation on June 30th, 1930.
The text was found on the internet with an introduction by Jerry
Hejka-Ekins, associate editor of Theosophical History, and was
originally published by N.V. Theosofische Vereeniging Uitgevers
Maatschappij in Amsterdam in 1930. Aryel Sanat's on-line manuscript
The Secret Doctrine, Krishnamurti, and Transformation addresses many
of the issues raised by van der Leeuw. Sanat's major contention is
that the "essence of the 'Secret Doctrine,' like that of J.
Krishnamurti's insights and observations, is human
transformation."

THEOSOPHY UNVISITED

by Jerry Hejka-Ekins

Preface

As part of regular discussion in the Theosophy list on the
Internet, it was suggested that I might recommend a book or article
that we might focus upon.

In response to this suggestion, I uploaded the scanned text of a
very scarce theosophical pamphlet written by J.J. van der Leeuw and
published in 1930. The subject concerns the conflict between
revelation and realization that has existed in the Theosophical
Society since the beginning, which van der Leeuw (and I) believe is
at the root of the failure of the Theosophical Society. For those
who are part of the ULT and Point Loma traditions, I would suggest
that the issues in this pamphlet also apply to these organizations,
though he is only addressing Adyar theosophical history here.

To give a little background, the Adyar Theosophical Society was
undergoing a crisis at the time this pamphlet was published.
Krishnamurti had been for some time contradicting the Master's
revelations and orders as given through Annie Besant and
C.W. Leadbeater, and by the end of 1929 Krishnamurti ordered the
dissolution of the Order of the Star and resigned from the
Theosophical Society. The text I am posting was originally a talk
given by J.J. van der Leeuw, where he analyzes the Theosophical
Society in order to discover what went wrong. Though this pamphlet
is over sixty years old, I believe that van de Leeuw's insights
continue to be as relevant today as they were then, because the
underlying problems that plagued the TS in 1930 are the same today.

Johannes Jacobus van der Leeuw (1893-1934) joined the TS in 1914
and quickly became a valued member of the inner circle. By 1921 he
became a Priest of the Liberal Catholic Church and won the Subba Row
Medal for The Fire of Creation, a theosophical classic that I
believe is still in print. He also published A Dramatic History of
the Christian Faith; The Conquest of Illusion; and Gods in Exile.
Tragically, like many before him who questioned the actions of the
wrong people, J.J. van der Leeuw lost his standing in the inner
circle after privately publishing this pamphlet. Of course, this
pamphlet has never been reprinted and has become very scarce. This
lack is now remedied.

I believe this pamphlet to be the most important theosophical
document published at the time, and certainly one of the most
important theosophical documents ever to be published - especially
for these times. Here, like no one else, van der Leeuw struggles
with the issue of revelations and realization in the TS and how this
conflict brought about a crisis, which is still with us today, and
is, I believe, primarily responsible for the poor state of affairs
of not only the Adyar TS, but for all Theosophical Organizations. I
submit that it is only when the Theosophical Organizations are able
to come to grips with this issue that they will ever have a chance
to take their position as an important movement in the world. Jerry
Hejka-Ekins, September, 1995.

Revelation or Realization:
The Conflict in Theosophy

by J.J. van der Leeuw, LL.D.

There was a time when no doubt seemed possible about the
future of the T.S. We had been told that the Masters of the Wisdom
had founded it and that it was to be the keystone of the religions
of the future. Consequently the possibility of its failure hardly
occurred to members; empires might crumble, churches might cease to
be, but the Theosophical Society would continue throughout the ages.

Of late, however, very serious doubts have arisen in the minds of
many concerning this future. The world at large is no longer as
interested in theosophy or the theosophical movement as it was forty
years ago. Then the Society was opposed as a dangerous pioneer
movement, now it is regarded with indifference and looked upon as a
relic of the past rather than a promise of the future. In almost
every Section there is a serious falling off of book sales showing
that the literature which once appealed to the public is no longer
desired.

More serious even than the indifference of the modern world with
regard to the movement is the conflict within it. I am not speaking
about a conflict between personalities; these do not matter. The
conflict is one between different standpoints, views of life. I
would define these as the conflict between revelation and
realization. This conflict has been inherent in the theosophical
movement from its inception, and has become acute since 1925. It
was then that on the one hand revelation became fantastic and
thereby questionable and on the other hand realization was
emphasized by Krishnamurti as the way of life.

A system of revelation is only possible when there is one oracle,
or channel of revelation, the authority of which is not to be
questioned. A plurality of oracles is death to revelation. When in
1925 it was announced that the World Teacher would have twelve
apostles as before in Palestine and when Krishnamurti himself denied
having any apostles or disciples at all it was inevitable that
members should begin to ask whether this revelation as well as
previous ones was to be trusted or not.

Previously the ceremonial movements had gained their adherents
largely because they were announced as a preparation of the work of
the coming teacher. In his name and on his authority were they
launched forth and those who took part in them felt they were doing
the teacher's work. When he began his teaching and denied the value
of ceremonial, calling it an obstacle to liberation, there were
again many who asked themselves how this contradiction could be
explained. Many and ingenious were the explanations put forward,
but the fact remained that the faith in revelation had been shaken
forever. The consequence of this has been that the work and
self-sacrifice of members in so far as these were based on such
faith in revelations, has fallen off considerably. In the hearts of
many doubt and despair have taken the place of unquestioning belief.
The inevitable result is a process of disintegration, in which many
of the most serious members leave a movement in which they no longer
have confidence.

It is my intention in this lecture to seek out the causes of this
disintegration and, if possible, to find a cure. I shall therefore
criticize quite frankly. Now criticism has always been exceedingly
unpopular in the Theosophical Society. In theory our platform is
free, but in practice one who thinks differently from the rest,
though perfectly free to do so, will find no platform to express his
thoughts. There has always been fear of any idea that might disturb
the harmony among the members. Criticism, however kindly expressed,
was immediately branded as "cruel and unjust attacks," as
"unbrotherly" and in the last resort as being under the
influence of the Dark Powers. It is the mediaeval attitude of mind
where the sulphur smell of satanic activity is detected whenever an
opinion is expressed different from its own.

I speak for love of truth, not to attack theosophy. The one
thing I should like to ask you is to credit me at least with the
sincere desire of helping our members in the present state of
confusion and not to suspect me of sinister intentions. I feel like
a doctor at a patient's bedside; he must look for the organs that
are diseased and can only help the patient by seeking out every
cause of ill health. When a doctor says that the patient's heart is
diseased we do not call him unbrotherly or say that he is attacking
the patient most cruelly; we do not tell him that he should look
only for the good in the patient and not for the evil, and that he
should rather emphasize the sound state of the lungs than the
diseased condition of the heart. I have to speak of the unhealthy
symptoms in the theosophical movement and it is only by a thorough
criticism that we can hope to analyze them.

In criticizing theosophy we must first of all ask: which
theosophy? Historically the word means the experience of the
divine, in distinction to theology which is discussion about God.
This experience of the ultimate, of reality, of life, of truth, is
beyond all discussion. It exists wherever a man has it and cannot
be criticized or denied. Secondly, the word has been used in an
early theosophical manifesto as "the archaic system of esoteric
wisdom in the keeping of the brotherhood of adepts."

I shall refer to this conception later on, but at present I am
not dealing with it. Thirdly, theosophy is taken to mean the system
of doctrines put forward in literature or lectures since the
beginning of the Theosophical Society. This is what the world at
large knows as theosophy. Finally, there is the practice in
important centres of theosophical work, where, in the work actually
done and in the aims held before people, we can see what is looked
upon as valuable. At the moment I am speaking only about these last
two forms of theosophy, that is to say, about that which has been
presented to the world in books or lectures or can be seen in
centres of theosophical work.

This theosophy was born in the Victorian Era. The end of the
nineteenth century was a period divorced from life. Man had lost
the sense of vital relations and had made objective absolutes out of
things which have meaning only as living relations. Thus he looked
upon the world surrounding him as an objective universe standing
opposite him, independent of his consciousness. Actually what we
call the world surrounding us is the way in which we interpret the
reality that affects our consciousness. This interpretation in
terms of our consciousness is our world-image which is real only
with relation to the consciousness of which it forms part. As long
as this relation is recognized all is well; life or reality affects
man and through him is externalized as a world-image in his
consciousness. Man is the focus through which this process takes
place, and there is an unimpeded flow of life reality affecting him
and, through him, becoming world-image.

When however, man forgets that he is only a focus of reality and
feels himself as a separate being, a soul or a spirit, all changes.
Instead of recognizing that what he calls the world is his
interpretation, in terms of consciousness, of the reality that
affects him, he objectivates that world-image and makes it into an
absolute, opposite him: the world of matter. In a similar way he
separates himself from that life which creates the world-image in
him, he objectivates that too and calls it God or Spirit. Thus he
finds himself isolated between two worlds: a world of gross matter
outside and a world of subtle spirit within. This duality
henceforth rules his life and in practice he has to choose between
its two elements. This choice is one between materialism and
idealism.

In the 19th century this antithesis was a very real one, and
theosophy, based on that dualism, identified itself with the
idealistic world-view as against the materialistic. It fought the
materialism of its day and was frankly idealistic or spiritual in
its philosophy. It still is; in theosophical doctrine the spiritual
world is looked upon as the real world in which man, the higher Self
has his true home. From that world he descends into these lower
worlds of matter where through his "lower bodies" he
gathers experience. When, through this experience his Self has
become perfected, it returns to that world beyond, whence it came.
Thus theosophy is a philosophy of the Beyond; its ultimate reality
is not this physical world but a world removed from it by several
stages, its fulfilment is not in the present but at a future time
when perfection shall be reached. Thus, in space and time, it is a
philosophy of the Beyond.

The world has changed considerably since the 19th century. The
greatest change has been that it has rediscovered life and thereby
re-established the vital relations which were lost in a period of
dualism. Thus modern man no longer recognizes a duality of spirit
and matter or, in scientific terms, force and mass, but sees these
two as convertible quantities which appear as one or the other
according to the position of the observer. A new outlook on life
has been born which is neither idealistic nor materialistic, still
less a compromise between the two. We can define it as a new
realism in the light of which idealism appears as outworn as
materialism. Its reality is not a world or worlds beyond, but the
meaning of this world as of any other world, man being as near to
reality in the physical world as in any other world in which he
might live. Similarly the fulfilment of life is not seen as a far
off apotheosis of ultimate perfection but in the realization of life
here and now.

Man himself is the open door to reality, he is the focus through
which reality becomes world-image and in his own actual experience
of the moment he can therefore find the open door to all life. This
is no mystic state, no "merging into the absolute," if
such a thing were possible; it is a process taking place in the
actual common experience of the actual present moment at the actual
place where man finds himself. The experience you have at this
actual moment at this place is the open door to reality - nothing
else. It is in the here and the now that the way of life is to be
found.

The men and women of the new age have therefore no time for a
dualistic philosophy which preaches an outworn idealism, they have
no interest in a philosophy of the Beyond. And such, in their eyes,
is theosophy. It was born in an age of dualism, it allied itself
with one of its two elements, the spiritual, its reality in a world
beyond and its perfection at a future date and is in that respect a
relic of the past rather than a promise of the future.

Unless its philosophy becomes one of the here and the now,
recognizing that reality or life can only be approached through the
actual experience of the moment, and nowhere else, there is no
future for it and it will cease to have other than a historical
interest.

Another characteristic of the 19th century was its fear of life.
Where man has disconnected himself from life he is afraid of it and
seeks a shelter or refuge. He looks for a final certainty, a system
which will solve all problems of life so that Life, which he dreads,
shall not be able to take him unawares or upset his comfortable
existence. A system of philosophy therefore which claims to solve
the problems of life and to be able to explain all that happens has
a very strong appeal for such a man.

Theosophy was such a philosophy; it claimed to have an answer to
the problems of life, to have solved its riddles. Even its enemies
must acknowledge that theosophists are unequalled in explaining all
that happens, however contradictory. With a true virtuosity they
perform the mental acrobatics by means of which they can assert or
believe one thing and yet find an explanation when the facts of life
contradict it.

Here the desire for truth is not so great as the desire to make
life fit in with a preconceived system. Man feels safe only when
nothing that happens to him in daily life escapes the system of
rational explanation which he has built up. When something happens
to him he wants to explain why it happened and what it is "good
for" ultimately. Thus he fits it in into his system of
thought; he has rationalized the event. When Krishnamurti began his
teaching the difficulty for most theosophists was not so much that
they could not understand the teaching as that they could not fit it
into their system of thought. The question was not: What does he
mean? but: How can this be reconciled with what we have been taught
before? Life, however, can never be reconciled to preconceived
thoughts, neither can it be rationalized. Life is not an
intelligence, therefore it is neither rational nor logical; it has
no cause and no purpose. The attempt to rationalize the suffering
that comes to us in life, to show that we have deserved it, and that
it is "good for something" ultimately, is therefore doomed
to failure; we cannot tame life in this way.

It is curious to see how man dreads the thought of life being
beyond explanation. He wants consolation, a drug which will dull
his suffering or a soothing sleeping draught which will give him an
illusion of bliss. The theosophist had such consolation and such
soporifics. No suffering could come to him, but he would soothe his
outraged humanity by a rationalizing process in which he proved to
himself that the suffering had to come to him, and that it would be
good for him. These attempts at explanations, however, blind man to
the true meaning of things that happen to him; they tempt his
attention away from the event itself, which again is the here and
the now, and lead it to some imaginary cause or result. Thus the
meaning of the event which lies in the actual experience, escapes
him and he is no richer, no wiser for his suffering.

In a similar way, theosophy claims to have an explanation of the
great problems of life: why the world was created and how, what
happens after death, why man lives and what he will become. Here
again, the process of rationalizing leads the attention away from
the mystery of life which can only be experienced in the present.
Life is not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be experienced.
It is the consummate ease with which theosophy explained all
problems and all events that has ever made true artists and thinkers
fight shy of it. They know too well that life cannot be contained
in any system, and that the purpose of thought is not to explain
life but to understand it, by experience.

A system of thought always brings about a state of mental
certainty and repose in which there remains only one fear, that of
being disturbed by doubt. That is why there has been no place for
thinkers in the Theosophical Society; a thinker is always a
disturbing influence. Theosophy, by claiming to offer a system of
thought that would explain life and its problems, has not only
scared away thinkers and artists, but has attracted the mediocre
mind that seeks intellectual comfort and not truth. This explains
why the theosophical movement, in the fifty years of its existence,
has been so singularly lacking in creative or original thought;
these were excluded automatically.

Once again, the great change that has taken place in the world
has passed by the Theosophical Society completely. Modern man has
rediscovered life and has consequently lost faith and interest in
any systems of thought claiming to explain life or solve its
riddles. He knows but too well that life can only be understood by
the realisation that comes through experience, not by any solutions
or doctrines. Our modern age has emerged beyond that narrow
conscious life which previously was all that man recognized in his
speculations. He is now aware of the unconscious without which the
conscious remains unintelligible.

He knows that life, not being consciousness, is irrational and
neither logical nor just. It is therefore in vain to look for
ethical explanations of its happenings or moral results of the
sufferings it inflicts on us. These can neither explain nor justify
the events that take place. The meaning of the event can only be
approached through the actual experience of it, and all search for
shelter, refuge or consolation leads man away from it. Modern man,
therefore, has no interest in a system of thought, however ingenious
and elaborate, that would allay his fears and offer him a false
repose by its attempts at explaining life. He does not want to be
protected; he does not seek the warm and drowsy comfort of the
fireside, he would rather go out naked and alone into the storm of
life than be safe in a shelter that excludes it. He would rather
perish in that storm than live in a false security. He does not
seek happiness, but life itself, reality. Therefore, a philosophy
which offers him the supposed security of explanations and solutions
has no appeal to him, it is no longer valid. He who in these modern
days claims to have solved the problems of life only succeeds in
compromising himself.

If there is to be any future for the Theosophical Society, it
will have to renounce utterly its claim of having solved the riddles
of life and being a repository of truth; instead it will have to
unite those who search for truth and for reality whatever these may
bring by way of suffering and discomfort. The seeker after truth
welcomes disturbance and doubt, the very things which were and are
feared most by theosophists.

In yet another respect does the Theosophical Society breathe the
atmosphere of last century. It is in the desire to unite in one
brotherhood all who think or feel alike. Thus the Theosophical
Society aimed at forming a nucleus of brotherhood. Such a nucleus
however always defeats its own ends. It cannot escape becoming a
brotherhood with the exclusion of less desirable brethren. The
moment we unite a number of people in such a nucleus we have created
a sect, a separate group walled off from the rest of the world and
thereby from life.

We show the truth of this each time we speak, as we so often do,
of the "outside world". The words imply that we ourselves
are inside something. Inside what? Inside something that keeps
that "outside world" outside that same something! Inside
a barrier which we have erected around us and by means of which we
have shut out those who think differently. That barrier of
elaborate beliefs and doctrines has so efficiently shut out the
dreaded "outside world" that no fresh air from that world
has succeeded in penetrating its inner fastnesses, and the Society
has breathed for fifty years nothing but the atmosphere of its own
thoughts and beliefs. At its meetings it was always theosophists
who told other theosophists about the theosophical doctrines which
they all knew already. The one thing that was prevented unanimously
was the introduction of foreign ideas which might challenge or doubt
the established doctrines. This exclusion of the outside world has
been most manifest in the lodge life. It was in the snug and stuffy
intimacy of lodge life that theosophical orthodoxy could breed;
there, in a small circle of mediocre minds, all thinking and
believing alike, a warm brotherliness could arise, uniting all in
the delightful certainty of possessing the esoteric truth while the
outside world lived on in darkness.

On my last lecture tour I visited a lodge, the president of which
told me that his lodge was "just one happy family." This
roused my misgivings, for I know what such happy families are like.
Then he continued saying that a few years back there had been a
member who was always questioning and challenging everything,
causing disturbance at their otherwise harmonious meetings. But now
that member had left their lodge, and all was harmony again. He
meant, of course, that the blissful drowsiness of their intellectual
slumbers which had for a while been disturbed by the one member who
happened to be alive had been re-established.

It is quite true that, theoretically, our platform is free, that
we have no dogmas, and that everyone is free to criticise. But if
he does, he will suffer a silent excommunication which will
effectually cold-shoulder him out of the nucleus of brotherhood. He
will be made to feel that his conduct is scandalous and unbrotherly,
that he is in the throes of the lower mind, that he is attacking
theosophy, and laying himself open to the influence of the Dark
Powers. And this attitude holds good not only among groups of
ignorant members; I have found it right up to the highest
authorities. Therefore, the talk about a free platform and the
perfect freedom of thought does not impress me; I know that there is
no such freedom, but rather an unconscious orthodoxy that has almost
succeeded in killing out the critical faculty among theosophists
altogether.

If the Society, in its pride, had not been so certain that it
walked in the light and had been called to bring this light to a
world in darkness, it might have noticed that the barriers, which it
built up between itself and the outside world, prevented the light
of life from coming in, so that it lived in darkness, while in the
outside world a new and great light had arisen. That world has
rediscovered the life about which theosophists talked, and
consequently, it will not suffer any more barriers. Therefore truly
modern men and women will no longer be come members of any Society,
so long as they feel that its brotherhood is a sect and its freedom
of thought an orthodoxy. The "outsider" feels that, by
entering the Theosophical Society, or any other spiritual movement,
he subscribes to a creed which excludes him from the rest of the
world, and enters a brotherhood which will make him different from
all who do not belong to it.

If the Theosophical Society is to survive, if it is to attract
those whom it has always endeavoured, and generally failed, to
attract, it will have to change its ways entirely. Above all, the
traditional lodge with its traditional meetings should be abolished.
There is no more dreadful mutual burden than that of the lodge which
has to meet every Tuesday night and then think of something to do.
The result must be a burden or an artificial semblance of life.

Once again, if the Theosophical Society is to continue, the old
form of membership which implies the silent acceptance of a creed
must go, and a loose organisation take its place in which membership
no more makes a man part of a sect than would, for instance,
membership of the National Geographic Society. Modern man will
suffer no barriers that shut life out in a supposed "outside
world"; he seeks the free and unimpeded contact with life.

II

So far I have dealt with the causes of the decline of the
Theosophical Movement in its relation to the world at large. Now we
must consider the more serious causes of disintegration within the
movement.

From its very beginning the Society has suffered from an internal
conflict which I characterized as that between realization and
revelation. In its historical meaning theosophy means realization,
the experience of the Divine within man. In that sense, it was used
in Neo-Platonic philosophy and by mediaeval philosophers. This
conception of Theosophy has been present in theosophical teaching
from the beginning. A man was to find the higher self within him
and thereby come into conscious unity with the Life in all things.
At the same time, however, theosophy is characterised as "the
archaic system of esoteric truth in the keeping of a brotherhood of
adepts." Here Theosophy is not a truth to be experienced by man
in himself, it is a body of doctrine possessed and guarded by a
group of Adepts in whose power it lay to reveal it to others. Thus
the way of knowledge became one of discipleship; only by becoming a
pupil of one of the Masters could man hope to partake of the
esoteric truth. The aim was to gain initiation into the
Brotherhood, to enter the Hierarchy that guarded the esoteric
wisdom. This way of knowledge is one of revelation; the divine
Wisdom is received by the pupil from his Master and handed on again
by him to those less enlightened than himself. Thus a hierarchic
system of revelation arises in which the authority of superiors is
not be questioned and the slightest hint is an order not to be
criticised but to be obeyed. The spirit is that of a spiritual army
where obedience and efficiency are greater virtues than individual
creative activity and genius. The way of realisation is the way of
the individual; its highest product is the creative genius. The way
of revelation is the way of the group; its highest product is the
perfect channel, obediently transmitting orders and power from
above.

We must sharply distinguish revelation from authority. Authority
is a fact in nature; where a man is superior in wisdom or power he
will automatically have authority over others. That this authority
can lead to abuse of power or to tyranny and impede the freedom of
others does not invalidate the fact that superiority in any respect
means authority.

But when I speak of revelation, I mean all information claiming
to come from an unseen source, from an inaccessible authority.
Primitive man looked upon some few as being intimately related to
the gods he feared and being able to reveal their will and power.
Thus the priest was a channel through whom the will, the knowledge
and the grace of the deity could be transmitted to the masses. Man
sought for guidance of his own life by the revelations coming to him
through the appointed oracle. The priesthood thus gained power over
men's souls and were able to enforce their own will by clothing it
in the garment of revelation from above. Therefore, revelation in
the meaning in which I use it here, is a message from an unseen
authority coming through an appointed channel.

In ordinary speech, we sometimes talk of things being "a
revelation to us," but that is not the sense in which the word
is used here. I can say that the Einstein theory is a revelation to
me, but it will be clear that no scientific work ever partakes of
the element of revelation. It does not speak in the name of an
unseen authority, the scientist speaks in his own name and what he
says can be questioned, criticised, proved or disproved. The
authority is always available, the source of knowledge is accessible
and, even though not every man has the means to prove whether the
Einstein theory is true or not, he knows that Einstein's brother
scientists have done their utmost to discover a flaw in it.

The bulk of our theosophical literature does not partake of the
element of revelation. If a theosophist writes a book describing
his experiences in this or other worlds, or expounding his ideas on
life and its problems, there is no revelation in such a work. The
one who wrote it is available, can be questioned and criticised, the
argument of the book can be discussed and contradicted; the entire
subject remains within the realm of reason. Yet even in the time of
H.P.B. the element of revelation was present in the Theosophical
Society. Thus, in the Mahatma Letters we find messages coming from
an unseen authority through an appointed channel. Later on, when
letters were no longer forthcoming, messages came directly through
certain recognized theosophical authorities. In these messages, the
Masters would express their desires as to what should be done or not
done, what activities undertaken or opposed, and give hints guiding
the lives of prospective pupils. Here we find real revelation:
messages from an unseen authority, inaccessible to others.
Theoretically, of course, the unseen authority is accessible to all
who succeed in raising their consciousness to its level; practically
it is not, and should any claim to have come into touch with the
same authority from whom messages were previously received through
another, that authority usually speaks through him with a very
different voice. We only need to compare the letters from the
Master K.H. produced in the time of H.P.B. and written in her
Bohemian manner interspersed with French expressions, often somewhat
racy in style, with the messages revealed as coming from that same
Master in recent years. They breathe an utterly different spirit;
where the former denied the existence of God in any form, seen or
unseen, personal or impersonal, the latter have reintroduced him in
a very personal way indeed. Where in the Mahatma Letters the Master
K.H. speaks of religion as being the greatest evil in human
civilisation, and denounces all churches, priesthoods and
ceremonials in definite terms, his more recent messages speak with
great reverence about religion and church and endorse ceremonial and
priesthood most vigorously. One is therefore inclined to think that
the source of unseen authority for each is a strictly individual and
subjective one, an exteriorisation of their own unconscious motives.
This is still more evident with regard to all messages revealed as
coming from the World Teacher during the last fifteen years.

When Krishnamurti began speaking in his own authority, and in his
own name as the World Teacher, the things he said were widely
different in spirit and purpose from all messages thus received.
First of all, he emphatically denied being the vehicle of another
consciousness or being used by anyone who spoke through him or
inspired him. He claimed to be the World Teacher, not because some
other intelligence possessed or used him, but be cause he had gained
liberation and become one with life, which is the only Teacher. He
utterly denied having any apostles or even disciples and rejected
ceremonial, however and wherever used, as an obstacle on the path to
liberation. Neither would he have anything to do with the occult
path of discipleship and initiation, characterising all these as
"unessentials." It was therefore inevitable that
theosophists all over the world should have begun to doubt all
previous revelations and to suspect that these were more in the
nature of subjective opinions.

It takes the mental acrobatics of trained theosophical students
to reconcile the contradictory facts contained in the earlier
revelations and the subsequent teaching of Krishnamurti. Even
though he himself strongly denies being used by another
consciousness, they claim to know better than he does what is
actually taking place in his own consciousness, and still maintain
that there is another person, the "real" World Teacher,
living in the Himalayas, who occasionally speaks through
Krishnamurti. This real World Teacher entirely endorses all
previous revelations, he has apostles and approves the ceremonial
movements, especially the Liberal Catholic Church. The fact that
Krishnamurti denies the value of all these is then explained by the
fact that he, being "only a vehicle", cannot express fully
the "glorious consciousness" which they, the speakers,
know so much more intimately than he. Thus it means nothing that he
should contradict things previously revealed, it only shows that at
that time, it was not the World Teacher speaking - but only Mr.
Krishnamurti. The interesting situation arises that a few people
are to be credited with the ability to tell us when Krishnamurti
speaks and when the World Teacher is speaking. The result would
seem to be that when the opinions agree with their own, it is the
World Teacher speaking, while otherwise it is Mr. Krishnamurti. The
only one who evidently is not to be believed, when he says the World
Teacher is speaking, is Mr. Krishnamurti himself.

It is needless to expound further the length to which
theosophical casuistry can go; the tragical fact remains that there
appears to be less desire to understand what Krishnamurti says than
to fit it in with revelations previously given. It would be far
simpler to recognize the previous revelations to have been
erroneous. But this, of course, would discredit the cause of
revelation.

Enough, however, has been said to show how fatal the effects of
revelation are in any movement. The fact that revelation is a
message coming from an unseen authority, inaccessible to others,
places it beyond the realm of reason and makes it impossible to
criticise or discuss its value. In all discussions which I have
ever had on the subject the adherents of revelation would always end
by saying, "Well, all I can say is that the Master told me to
do this, and so I do it." This ends any discussion, and puts
the question beyond reason. Thus I maintain that the evil effects
of revelation are caused by the fact that revelation can only be
accepted or denied, but never criticised in the light of reason. I
know that theoretically this can be done, and whenever the subject
is brought up, we are told that theosophical leaders have always
urged their disciples to judge for themselves and not accept
anything because they said it. This, however, is theory; in
practice, one who ventured to criticise or doubt a message coming
from the Master, would suffer the silent excommunication of the
heretic, and be made to feel that he was unfit to be of the elect.
Of what value is the freedom to criticise and to judge for oneself
when, in the rare cases, where some brave soul has ventured to do
so, we are told that "in incarnations to come, he will, through
untold suffering, grope in vain for the light which he thus wilfully
rejected"? This is but Eternal Damnation in another form. It
is the threat and fear of punishment to come which terrorises the
would-be critic back into an attitude of obedient submissiveness.
In the Mahatma Letters and the correspondence between H.P.B. and
Sinnett, we can read what is said about those who do not take a hint
once given, or who dare to argue about an order coming from above.
Even Sinnett himself was repeatedly threatened with the breaking off
of all further intercourse with his Master if he did not follow the
orders given. And there is no doubt that, if a theosophist at any
time criticises or rejects a message coming to him from the Master
through an appointed channel, he will thereby be said to have cut
himself off for a long time to come from any further such
privileges. Where simultaneously discipleship and a drawing nearer
to the Master are held up as the goal of life, it is clear that the
theoretical freedom of criticism means the giving up of all that is
held dearest and highest in the life of theosophists.

I wish to make it perfectly clear that I am in no wise denying
the existence of the Masters or the possibility of communion with
them. If I think that the Master has spoken to me, this fact
implies no revelation, but only experience: I have an experience
which may or may not be of value to me. Revelation only begins when
I transmit to others the messages thus received as coming from that
unseen authority. I should like to suggest that anyone who thinks
he or she has received a message or order from a Master or higher
authority should first see whether he himself agrees with it,
whether it awakens a response in his own soul. If so, let him, when
speaking about it to others, speak in his own name and say, "I
think this, and I will this". But never let him say, "The
Master thinks this or the Master wills this". Should he
himself not agree with the communication thus received, let him say
nothing at all. But let him never speak in the name of an unseen
authority. Revelation is still more fatal when it interferes with
the life of the individual and attempts to guide his life, to tell
him what to do or where he stands. It has been the custom in
theosophical centres to look to a few as being able to tell others
where they stand in their spiritual evolution, whether they have
taken a step forward or not. Thus spiritual progress is made to
depend on revelation, and power is given to a few to tell others
where they stand. The consequences of this are always fatal. The
absurdity of the situation becomes clear when we consider that if
these few people, supposed to be able to tell us where we stand,
were to die, we should be lost in uncertainty. Again, if the
appointed channels should disagree, as has happened before, we have
to choose whom we are going to believe and whom not! It is
inevitable that where such power is placed in the hands of the few,
their own personal likes and dislikes will unconsciously influence
the occult standing they confer on others. These, on the other
hand, may be afraid to contradict or oppose one who has the power to
bestow or withhold steps, but will try to keep in good standing, and
do what they are asked to do. Thus a host of spiritual inquiries
are born, detrimental to the individual and to the cause he serves.
But above all, the fact remains that it is impossible at any time
for any one to tell another where he stands in spiritual progress.
No one can reveal that to you but the life that is in you. Each
individual is as a ray going forth from the centre of the circle; he
can only enter the centre of life along the ray that is his own
being, never along another. Life expresses itself in each one of us
in a way which we alone, and no one else, can know; there is a
sanctuary of life in each of us where we alone can enter and hear
the voice of. We cannot enter that sanctuary by the backstairs of
revelation; there is only the royal road of our own daily experience
of life. No one can tell you what to do in life, what work to serve
but the voice of life that is within you, your own inner vocation,
your individual uniqueness. To go to another, and to ask him what
you should do or where you stand is to violate the life that is
within you, and to shut yourself off from it.

I wish to emphasize that I do not deny the existence of the
occult path or the steps on it such as discipleship or initiation.
Their existence or non-existence lies outside the subject I am
dealing with. The element of revelation only enters where any one,
in the name of an unseen and inaccessible authority tells others
where they stand and what steps they have taken, so that no one is
supposed to have taken a step unless one of the few acknowledged
channels of revelation has affirmed him to have done so.

Nothing would be lost if this practice with all its fatal
consequences were discontinued. If the taking of a step means an
expansion of life within, that expansion will be there and show
itself whether anyone else says you have taken a step or not. What
would it avail you if everyone acknowledged you as having taken a
step and the expansion of life were not within you, and on the other
hand, what do you lose if everyone should agree in saying you have
not taken a step and the expansion of life is in you and shows forth
in your daily life? The telling or not telling is wholly
unessential and wholly mischievous in its consequences. It makes
for a spiritual snobbery in which the elect sit in the seats of
honour, while the common herd are despised.

Though the results of revelation are always fatal, and opposed to
the spirit of theosophy, which is realisation, it is most dangerous
where it interferes with the individual lives of people and attempts
to make them cease from work they are doing or undertake work they
have no intention of doing. Especially where young people are
concerned such interference is inexcusable. I know cases where, on
the basis of revelation, young people have been taken out of their
university studies in order that they might dedicate themselves to
"the Work." As if the Work for each one were not that
which the life within him urges him to do, instead of the revelation
coming from another! In modern education, especially in the
Montessori method, it is fully recognized that the way of life is
the way of realization. The child is surrounded by didactic
material, the only purpose of which is to draw out its faculties and
to enable it to learn by experience. In this way the child will
spontaneously grow into that which the life within it means it to
be.

Opposed to this spirit of life is the army spirit where orders
come from above and have to be obeyed without argument or delay. It
is this spirit which inevitably accompanies revelation; a spiritual
hierarchy is like a spiritual army where orders are obeyed and not
questioned. In this army-spirit individual uniqueness and creative
genius are crushed out. We cannot therefore wonder why there has
been so little creative work in the Theosophical Society; it is
because the ideal of the "band of servers" has been
obedience to revelation, and not self-expression through
realization.

There is no reason why anyone should not occasionally seek the
advice of those wiser than himself, and discuss with them his
difficulties. There is no reason why we should not try to learn as
much as we can from teachers and books, so long as we realize that
we have to make our decisions in our own name and that it is
weakness to shift the responsibility on to others. We must have no
fear to guide our own lives. Better to perish in the attempt than
go safely along the way of another.

There is no future for the Theosophical Society unless the evil
of revelation be shaken off, never to return. It is wholly
incompatible with Theosophy which is essentially experience of the
Divine, or realization. It is not another "path" or
"aspect"; superstition is no path, but an error. There is
a pseudo-tolerance which agrees with the most conflicting views,
admiring them all impartially, and trying to get "some good out
of each one." This tolerance is in reality a lack of backbone,
an absence of vigorous life.

Let no one say that in my address I have denied occultism. There
is a future for occultism if it will conform to strictly scientific
methods, and submit to tests and proof. It can only develop if it
renounces entirely all spiritual or religious claims; it has as
little to do with these as ordinary science. Just as science could
not develop until it shook off the mystical and spiritual glamour
with which it was enveloped in the Middle Ages, so the condition of
progress for occultism as a science is that it should likewise
discard the halo of mystery in which it is enveloped.

When the question is asked: Has the Theosophical Society a
future? I can only answer that I do not know. But what I can say
with utter certainty is that it has no future unless it breaks free
from the outworn mentality that still permeates it and is born anew
in the spirit of the new age. That spirit is one of love of life
instead of fear of life, one in which life is welcomed even though
it may destroy the beliefs in which we found refuge hitherto.

Theosophy must cease to be a philosophy of the Beyond; it must
conquer the duality in which it is still rooted and realize that the
open door to reality lies in the here and the now, in man's actual
daily experience and not in some higher world or some distant
future. None can open this door for us and none can close it. It
is no mystical experience for the few alone; it is for all and it is
only our fear of life that makes us incapable of seeing it.

Theosophy has to realise that its claim of being a philosophical
system, explaining the problems of life, has no appeal to modern man
who knows that life is not a problem to be solved; to whom it is a
search and an ever increasing experience.

The Society must cease to be a brotherhood with the exclusion of
less desirable brethren; it must break down the barriers which make
it possible to speak of an "outside world", and create a
new form of membership which does not involve sectarian allegiance.

Above all, theosophists must learn to recognize the conflict that
has been inherent in theosophy from the beginning: that between
realization and revelation. Theosophy, as the realization of life
by each man in his own consciousness, is incompatible with a
hierarchic system of revelation where truth and enlightenment come
to us through others and where the guidance of our life rests on
orders received from superiors.

Modern man no longer desires a shelter or a refuge, consolation
or security. Rather than stagnate in the false repose and happiness
which these can give, he will go out alone and face the storm of
life in his own strength. The aim of theosophy is to breed, not
weaklings, but strong men.